Beverage Processing and Packaging
It is well established within beverage production and packaging facilities that highly sanitary conditions, and effective protocols therefor, must be maintained in order to satisfy internal quality assurance requirements and meet batch release specifications.
With progressively more diverse beverage types being developed, manufactured, and packaged within the same facility using the same production lines, the pressure to increase productivity and still accommodate the reliable supply of an expanding number of different product varieties necessitates effective cleaning and disinfecting strategies to prevent microbial contamination and to prevent the carryover of residual contaminating ingredients (e.g., flavors, colors, alcohol content, etc.) between different batches and product types.
Given that most beverage manufacturing and packaging equipment is part of a permanent installation (i.e., the individual system components cannot conveniently be removed and separately treated), the cleaning and disinfection thereof requires the introduction and circulation of dedicated agents throughout the entire system, rather than allowing specific individual interventions which would necessitate that the equipment be disassembled and manually cleaned and disinfected. “Cleaning-in-Place” (CIP) thus refers to the practice of circulating cleaning and disinfecting agents throughout the entire assembly of system components, equipment, and subsystems. “Cleaning-out-Place” (COP), on the other hand, refers to those procedures wherein disassembled equipment and removable fixtures are cleaned and disinfected separately and largely by hand at stations away from the permanent manufacturing and packaging systems.
The diverse products that are prepared and packaged within the same facility using the same filling equipment can often even comprise both alcoholic and non-alcoholic products. The packaging conditions for all such products is governed by the same stringent cleaning and disinfection prescriptions that are mandated to preclude cross contamination that would apply between highly flavorful and odor intense products and bottled water. Optimal removal of these robust flavors or alcoholic residues remains a primary limitation to the quick cleaning and turn-around of the filling line and contributes to the large amount of water typically consumed during line and filler head cleaning when switching between incompatible and non-benign products.
Aside from the ubiquitous likelihood of microbial contamination and the associated potential for product spoilage and deterioration, further product quality criteria that must comply with internal batch release specifications include color, taste, smell, and overall character such as foaming ability and beverage consistency.
Conventional measures heretofore used to address these concerns and limitations have comprised: the use of solutions or remedies heated to substantially elevated temperatures; the use of increased liquid and gaseous pressures; the use of high fluid circulation rates; and extended exposure to high concentrations of caustic detergents and potentially hazardous biocidal compounds.
However, these measures, whilst being largely effective for cleaning and sanitation, remain substantially deficient in terms of (a) the loss of productivity resulting from the current inability in the industry to quickly switch the processing line from one product to another and (b) the high energy, potable water, and labor demands of the prior procedures. In addition to controlling the high cost of other items in the manufacture and packing process, water consumption also remains a pivotal criterion for production efficiency measurement and management.
Besides the cleaning and sanitization procedures discussed above, further measures are typically used to ensure the quality of process and ingredient water used in beverage processing plants. Such procedures include a variety of filtration technologies including the use of synthetic membranes of varying porosities and the use of Granular Activated Charcoal (GAC) beds or columns for the ‘scrubbing’ of partially processed water to achieve selective removal of hazardous pesticides and fungicides, toxins, inorganic compounds, and organic residues or contaminants.
Unfortunately, any filtration technology, whether membrane based and/or GAC in type, will continuously trap the agents or elements that are being filtered. These filtrates progressively accumulate to the point that the selective separation efficiency of the system is compromised. The maintenance and rejuvenation of these fouled filtration systems has thus heretofore required either (a) costly and largely non-environmentally friendly intermittent replacement of the core filtration components or (b) physical (heat) and/or chemical interventions to rehabilitate and restore the systems to functional efficiency
The discharge of large volumes of soiled effluent solutions (e.g., effluents containing beverage ingredients, disinfectants, cleaning chemicals, etc.) into waste water reticulation systems is also an important environmental constraint to optimal beverage production and packaging capacity. Steps to limit the amounts of CIP chemicals and/or beverage contaminants in the effluent streams include the installation of systems to recover and store the different chemical agents for re-use, as well as efforts to limit the amount of rinse water used to remove the chemical residues from the diverse systems after cleaning and disinfection. While more efficient and judicious water and chemical usage provides a degree of improvement in the quantity and quality of the effluent discharge, the quality and quantity of the effluent discharge continues to constitute a critical production constraint in beverage manufacturing and packaging facilities.
Aside from the need to enhance the degree of efficiency and quality compliance achieved during the manufacture and packaging of beverage products, it is also critical to the maintenance of final product integrity that due effort be invested in ensuring that beverage dispensing systems (e.g., water and soda fountains and draft beer dispensers) be similarly cleaned of residual product and disinfected. Product residues serve as a medium for further microbial growth and, thus, biofilm development, and have an adverse impact upon dispensed product quality, health, and safety.
Consequently, in a production environment where there is a great deal of pressure to optimize the productivity of existing fixed assets (i.e., processing and packaging lines, etc.) and where there is a progressively heightened consumer and shareholder awareness and disapproval of the inefficient usage of resources, a great need exists for a more holistic and progressively renewable approach to cleaning and sanitation in order to realize sustainable quality assurance and enhanced productivity.
Electrochemically Activated Water (ECA)
It is well known that electrochemically activated (ECA) water can be produced from diluted dissociative salt solutions by passing an electrical current through the electrolyte solution in order to produce separable catholyte and anolyte products. The catholyte, which is the solution exiting the cathodal chamber, is an anti-oxidant which typically has a pH in the range of from about 8 to about 13 and an oxidation-reduction (redox) potential (ORP) in the range of from about −200 mV to about −1100 mV. The anolyte, which is the solution exiting the anodal chamber, is an oxidant which typically has a pH in the range of 2 to about 8, an ORP in the range of +300 mV to about +1200 mV and a Free Available Oxidant (FAO) concentration of ≦300 ppm.
During electrochemical activation of aqueous electrolyte solutions, various oxidative and reductive species can be present in solution, for example: HOCl (hypochlorous acid); ClO2 (chlorine dioxide); OCl− (hypochlorite); Cl2 (chlorine); O2 (oxygen); H2O2 (hydrogen peroxide); OH− (hydroxyl); and H2 (hydrogen). The presence or absence of any particular reactive species in solution is predominantly influenced by the derivative salt used and the final solution pH. So, for example, at pH 3 or below, HOCl tends to convert to Cl2, which increases toxicity levels. At a pH below 5, low chloride concentrations tend to produce HOCl, but high chloride concentrations typically produce Cl2 gas. At a pH above 7.5, hypochlorite ions (OCl−) are typically the dominant species. At a pH >9, the oxidants (chlorites, hypochlorites) tend to convert to non-oxidants (chloride, chlorates and perchlorates) and active chlorine (i.e. defined as Cl2, HOCl and ClO−) is typically lost due to conversion to chlorate (ClO3−). At a pH of 4.5-7.5, the predominant species are typically HOCl (hypochlorous acid), O3 (ozone), O22− (peroxide ions) and O2− (superoxide ions).
For this reason, anolyte will typically predominantly comprise species such as ClO; ClO−; HOCl; OH−; HO2; H2O2; O3; S2O82− and Cl2O62−, while catholyte will typically predominantly comprise species such as NaOH; KOH; Ca(OH)2; Mg (OH)2; HO−; H3O2−; HO2−; H2O2−; O2−; OH− and O22−. The order of oxidizing power of these species is: HOCl (strongest)>Cl2>OCl− (least powerful). For this reason, anolyte has a much higher antimicrobial and disinfectant efficacy in comparison to that of catholyte, or of commercially available stabilized chlorine formulations used at the recommended dosages.